Washington Huskies vs. Oregon Ducks: love ’em & hate ’em style

Washington 21 – 52 Oregon

The latest edition of The Border War resulted in yet another blowout victory for the Oregon Ducks, sending the Washington Huskies and their visiting fans back to Seattle feeling rather sour about their performance and coach.

Washington, coming into this game flying high off of a big win over the Stanford Cardinal, failed to produce anything early on as the Ducks surged out to a 21-0 lead in the first quarter.

While the Huskies did manage to put points on the board, the Ducks did so at a much more explosive rate, once again showcasing their offensive and defensive prowess.

With the effort Oregon put forward on Saturday night, the Ducks asserted their dominance over a Husky team that is not yet ready to compete with the top teams in college football.

And so, with the Ducks surging to 6-0 and flying high while the Huskies have their tails between their legs, here are this week’s love ’em and hate ’em.

Love ’em

Nine in a Row

Oregon, who had previously set a Washington series record with eight victories in a row, extended their winning streak over the Huskies to an impressive nine games.

The Ducks trounced the Huskies by a score of 52-21 to extend their winning streak over their rivals to nine straight games. (Photo: oregonlive.com)

Though the Ducks were heavily favored in this game, Husky fans were still as pesky as ever as they stood strong with their team and tried to figure out a way Washington could come out of Eugene with one of the bigger upsets of the college football season.

Unfortunately for all Husky fans, that was not about to happen.

The Huskies will now not have a win over the Ducks for an entire decade, a surprising statistic considering the fact that many Husky fans still believe the Ducks are inferior to them.

Duck Defense is Stellar

Much has been made about the improvement Oregon’s defense has made over the past few years, improvements that were evident against the Huskies on Saturday night.

Oregon used their physicality and speed on the defensive front to disrupt Washington’s backfield, particularly how hurried they made quarterback Keith Price operate all night long.

With the amount of pressure they were allowed to put on Price, the Ducks eliminated the threat of explosive plays from a Washington team that needed all the explosion they could get to contend with the Ducks.

Bowl Eligible

While the Ducks will be looking to contend for a BCS National Championship this season, it is always nice to know that the worst their program can do this season is still jump into a bowl game.

Bye Week before Big Games

After stating the season 6-0, the Ducks will be heading into their bye week with a lot of momentum.

This years’ bye week for the Ducks comes at the most opportune time as it falls before the toughest portion of Oregon’s schedule.

Oregon’s next game, a Thursday night road game against a dangerous Arizona State Sun Devils, will be a lot more contentious than a lot of people may have previously thought.

The Ducks will take the time off to recuperate and take a deep breath before their run towards yet another Pac-12 Championship.

Hate ’em

Rushing Yards Allowed

While Oregon’s defense limited the Huskies to just 353 offensive yards on the day, over 200 of those yards came on the ground even with Washington’s offensive line being severely depleted.

Heading forward, the Ducks will need to find a way to put more pressure on opposing run games if they are to contend with top-level college football programs.